Rebuilding Strategic Thinking

By Gregory F. Treverton

Not just strategic analysis but strategy is more important now than ever. Churchill is said to have commented after a particularly undistinguished meal, “The pudding [that’s dessert for us Americans] lacked a theme.” That is too, too true of the world before us. If that world is less existentially dangerous than the high Cold War, it is scary in its shapelessness. Threats seem to emanate from everywhere, unpredictably, even at a luncheon in San Bernardino or a nightclub in Orlando. It is a world that cries out for old-fashioned strategic analysis as an input to strategy: what is important, what is less so? How do issues connect or relate to each other? And where are the trends taking us? Where and how should we intervene, and where should we disengage? What are the important investments to make? What should we be aiming for a decade hence?

Greg Treverton stepped down as Chair of the US National Intelligence Council in January 2017. He is Professor of the Practice of International Relations at the University of Southern California, and an SMA Executive Advisor.

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